Ride London Start Times

[sidicks]

swerni said:

When we came down to rejoin the Dorking road, there were lots or riders coming from the left that had been directed straight after Newlands,

According to the BBC, some riders had effectively been given a 25mile short cut!

[Black can man]

sidicks said:

swerni said:

When we came down to rejoin the Dorking road, there were lots or riders coming from the left that had been directed straight after Newlands,

According to the BBC, some riders had effectively been given a 25mile short cut!

Box & Newlands are pretty easy compared to Leith which hurt me a little yesterday.


& is hasn't registered on my Strava

[okgo]

Personally I think she should send the sportive round the pro route, that would be more interesting.

A few people from our club were under 4 hours, seemed that when I wandered down to end of the road to watch a few come by it was mostly people having a laugh, amazing mix of bikes that people were using.

[CharlieB]

I thoroughly enjoyed this! Went off far too quickly having not done 100 before or ridden properly for 5 odd years, zero training, overweight and fiercely competitive I had not considered how my legs would just seize up on the hills, almost comical game of two halves for me.

I saw the result of the crash and passed the ambulance coming to his aid, didn't look too good I have to say. I blew up on Leith, and picked up a puncture before box, so it felt like I was in the wilderness with no one faster passing me whilst I was going backwards, they must have closed it about 5 mins after I went through. Thus middle section was a tough old slog physically and mentally.

Have not done anything like this before, (I was riding for a CLIC who helped out a very close friends 3yo nephew who has AML Leukaemia), the crowds did a great job of getting everyone re motivated on the way back in and I was overwhelmed at the end. Will try to go again next year in a non charity spot and go for under 6hrs.

[alfabadass]

sidicks said:

According to the BBC, some riders had effectively been given a 25mile short cut!

Essentially yes. Several thousand of us. I only did 75 miles in the end. They cut the surrey hills out totally.

[scubadude]

FWIW if you put 25000 people together and just asked them to stand around for 8hours at least 1 would need an ambulance anyway!
I've never been to a sporting event, concert, festival where no-one has had an accident or got sick, its actually remarkable that you can send 25K people to cycle 100mile and only a handful needed medical attention.

I did it in 2014 (the wet year) and we where all diverted past the hills for safety reasons so even the narrowest roads where reasonable wide, I think you could say that given the numbers a route avoiding Leith and Box and sticking to wide roads would be safer/better- same issue that the London to Brighton always has.

The other issue is some people struggling to average 12mph while being passed by groups of semi-pro middle aged carbon warriors averaging 30mph, they either need to stream the event better or apply a more stringent entry requirement.

[okgo]

Lets be clear, there are no semi pro riders doing this event

As Steve said, many people clearly were a bit untruthful about their ability on the form?

[Black can man]

CharlieB said:

I thoroughly enjoyed this! Went off far too quickly having not done 100 before or ridden properly for 5 odd years,
.

I think most people do, i found it extremely difficult not to get caught up with all the testosterone grr.grrr.


I knew i had to slow down but riding through the Limehose link, Canary wharf, lower Thames street, Trafalger square , knihgtsbrige & the A4 with no cars was simply to tempting to resist.

Edited by Black can man on Monday 1st August 11:28

[Marcellus]

Perhaps not untruthful just over optimistic?

Anyway, despite my earlier whinge, if it was a true sportif and not a race then why promote Team Entries?

Thinking about the safety aspects what what the organisers could do to mitigate them yes they could revise the route to take out the pinch points, but could also have a system of "rolling roadblocks" if an incident does occur?

Not sure how they woudl plans for it but yesterday, I forget where but some point after Wimbledon, 2 marshall motorbikes pulled in front of us and made it clear not to overtake.... they ride at about 15mph and formed a split, grouped a couple of 100 riders together and then another couple of motor bikes dropped in behind and formed another group it effectively neutralised the raceride for a couple of miles, when they peeled off yes some did put the hammer down but they did spread the riders out again so it was safer.

[Aretnap]

Black can man said:

We were stuck at Pyrford for at least an hour, Was leith hill taken out for riders then ? it was open for us .

You must have been a bit ahead of me. The road up Leith looked like it had just been closed off when I got there just after 1pm - the marshals were still fiddling with the last couple of cones. I think the plan had always been to divert it at that time anyway, so the slower riders at the back would get round the course in the time allowed. I was a little aggrieved at being treated as a slower rider just because I'd been stuck for the better part of an hour and a half at Pyford, and thought they might have made some allowances and kept it open a bit longer, but ho hum - these decisions can't be easy. Some bloke was remonstrating with the stewards, to no effect.

I heard that Leith turned into a bit of a traffic jam with everybody bunched together anyway - did it? (Please say yes - I'll feel better about missing it).

Apparently later on they put in a diversion which cut out the Surrey Hills altogether ( Linky).

[Black can man]

Leith was ok TBH , i'd say i passed 50 or so walking up but they were all in single file & the route up there was most civilised.


I thought the biggest problem on the day were the club train cycling Rambo's that were hell bent on shaving a few seconds off of last years times.


Weren't the people on route utterly fantastic eh ?

[Mosman]

Black can man said:

Does anybody know how to update a recorded ride from Garmin Strava ? It's recognised the 3 little rides & not the big one, yet it's showing nice n clear on my Garmin connect

Strava had technical issues over the weekend. Failed or slow uploads and segments not showing up so perhaps that's the issue?

[Black can man]

Mosman said:

Black can man said:

Does anybody know how to update a recorded ride from Garmin Strava ? It's recognised the 3 little rides & not the big one, yet it's showing nice n clear on my Garmin connect

Strava had technical issues over the weekend. Failed or slow uploads and segments not showing up so perhaps that's the issue?

Yeah thanks, i have sussed out how to do it manually , there is a section on Strava telling you how to do it.


I guess that when theres so many doing one ride it's inevitable that something is going to confuse even the most sophisticated of set ups

[yellowjack]

Aretnap said:

You must have been a bit ahead of me. The road up Leith looked like it had just been closed off when I got there just after 1pm - the marshals were still fiddling with the last couple of cones. I think the plan had always been to divert it at that time anyway, so the slower riders at the back would get round the course in the time allowed. I was a little aggrieved at being treated as a slower rider just because I'd been stuck for the better part of an hour and a half at Pyford, and thought they might have made some allowances and kept it open a bit longer, but ho hum - these decisions can't be easy. Some bloke was remonstrating with the stewards, to no effect.

The diversion wasn't really about 'treating you as a slower rider'. The bare facts are that the professional race is steaming along behind you, and needs you OFF the A25 while they do three laps of Ranmore. So they have to have the amateurs through Dorking and off up Box BEFORE the peloton arrives. There can't be any sportive event riders still coming down off Leith Hill when the pros are on the A25. Too many team cars and course support vehicles zipping about at silly speeds along the route by then.

I was following on after the race, and got up Holmbury and Leith OK, but was stuck at the closure for the right turn onto the A25 because the pro race was just coming through for it's last pass on it's way to Dorking. Then it took ages after the last group for the 'End of Race' car to arrive, and even then there were team cars and a couple of ambulances (and even one Team Rwanda rider) behind that.

Some idiots who'd been watching the race even headed off toward the oncoming team cars, ignoring warnings from marshals. I waited until the closure was lifted and got an escort into Dorking from one of the bike marshals, encouraging me and sounding his whistle - I felt properly "pro" for ooh? A minute,at least...

[Mr Will]

Marcellus said:

Jimbo. said:

"Seemed to me there was a lot of poor discipline on the road with a lot of riders unable to hold a straight line!"

It's a sportive, what did you expect?!

It's not too much to think that people riding 100 miles averaging at least 12.5mph could ride in a straight line.

If they can't then they should do as briefed if having a "Gentle ride" stay as left as possible and not wobble all over the road "just because it's closed and you can (not you personally but those in general).... often it was safer to undertake than over take.

I wonder how many of them were on the 46 mile version rather than the full hundred?

[ALawson]

Black can man said:

I thought the biggest problem on the day were the club train cycling Rambo's that were hell bent on shaving a few seconds off of last years times.

20 minutes actually but you are correct, there were plenty of "train" not stopping for anything. No awareness of other riders and the predictable behaviour when coming into narrow sections of roads, 90 degree bends etc.

[okgo]

Why would anyone half decent not get a super early start though?

I assume that is the design...

[outnumbered]

Aretnap said:

I heard that Leith turned into a bit of a traffic jam with everybody bunched together anyway - did it? (Please say yes - I'll feel better about missing it).

We must have been just a few mins ahead of you, and did get to go up Leith Hill. We had to walk for a while, but the marshals were doing a good job trying to restart the flow by sending people up in batches. Probably no more than 5-10min delay in the end.

I think that unless you're off in the first few thousand, it's going to be a lottery how your ride goes, and you just have to enjoy the experience rather than focus on achieving a particular finish time. Unless they change the course, I think long delays due to crashes are almost inevitable for later starters. We got held up for just a minute or two behind this one: http://www.getsurrey.co.uk/news/surrey-news/ridelo... , no problem as it's a wide road. Same thing on a narrow lane and that's another hour lost for everyone behind it.

Overall, it was fun and something I'll remember for a long time, but also a massive faff logistically, and I'm not sure I'd bother to enter again, given all the walking we ended up doing.

[Marcellus]

Mr Will said:

Marcellus said:

Jimbo. said:

"Seemed to me there was a lot of poor discipline on the road with a lot of riders unable to hold a straight line!"

It's a sportive, what did you expect?!

It's not too much to think that people riding 100 miles averaging at least 12.5mph could ride in a straight line.

If they can't then they should do as briefed if having a "Gentle ride" stay as left as possible and not wobble all over the road "just because it's closed and you can (not you personally but those in general).... often it was safer to undertake than over take.

I wonder how many of them were on the 46 mile version rather than the full hundred?

Between Kingston Bridge right turn and Esher very few... unless they missed the split and had done the extra miles (which could explain the wobbling)

[Type R Tom]

Maybe there need to be a question next year: “are you a hardcore cyclist chasing a time?” and then they can allocate slots accordingly. In my opinion (this was my 3rd time) the hardcores are as equally a problem as the amateurs not holding a line. It all depends what you want the event to be, a race or a charity ride. People shouting “on your right” going up Leigh Hill is not helpful when we are all bunched up.

It does surprise me that the fast riders have such an issue with other riders when 99.9% of the rest of the time they are mixing it up with traffic, peds and a whole manor of random events which are safely negotiated. Unless of course you are using the closed roads to “race” which if you are isn’t the point